Optical arrangements of the type under discussion here are known, for instance, from German patent application DE 196 54 210 A1. In technical circles, such arrangements are called K-scanners. The known K-scanners have the disadvantage that, due to the fact that they are coupled in along the direction of the optical axis, the arrangement has a relatively large physical size and can only be miniaturized to a limited extent. Moreover, the first mirror in the beam path is struck by the incident light beam at an extremely flat angle, so that the mirror has to have an unusually large surface area. The scanning rate is correspondingly limited. Moreover, in this form, the scanner is very polarization-dependent.
German patent application DE 100 33 549 A1 likewise discloses a so-called K-scanner that is coupled in at 90° relative to the optical axis, so that fundamentally, a smaller size can be achieved than with the above-mentioned K-scanner. In this case, the coupling is done via a coupling mirror that is independent of the actual deflection devices and their mirrors and that is arranged so as to be stationary. With these prior-art K-scanners as well, the first mirror of the deflection device is struck by the light beam at an extremely flat angle so that the same drawbacks arise as with the K-scanner from the above-mentioned publication. Undesired polarization effects occur here, too.